Atari Hardware documents?

[Dastari Creel]

Greetings!

 

I used to have a 2600 but my parents sold that in 1990 and I haven't had an Atari system until today when I picked up a 7800. I have been active in the NES forums for the last couple of years though and I was curious. Is there a comparable Atari website to nesdev.parodius.com? Are there tutorials and documents about 2600/7800 hardware for both the systems and cartridges? Do people have tutorials on how to create new carts? Does anyone create new boards like retrousb does for NES or has anyone ever created something comparable to the NES powerpak for Atari?

 

I'm very curious as I want to get further into the hardware and software of the older video games and was wondering if there were references for the Atari.

 

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

[DanBoris]

Greetings!

 

I used to have a 2600 but my parents sold that in 1990 and I haven't had an Atari system until today when I picked up a 7800. I have been active in the NES forums for the last couple of years though and I was curious. Is there a comparable Atari website to nesdev.parodius.com? Are there tutorials and documents about 2600/7800 hardware for both the systems and cartridges? Do people have tutorials on how to create new carts? Does anyone create new boards like retrousb does for NES or has anyone ever created something comparable to the NES powerpak for Atari?

 

I'm very curious as I want to get further into the hardware and software of the older video games and was wondering if there were references for the Atari.

 

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

 

I have a lot of information on the 2600 and 7800 on my web site http://www.atarihq.com/danb/ along with links to a lot of other good pages on the 2600/7800 hardware.

 

There are also good 2600 and 7800 message boards here at Atari Age frequented by a lot of knowledgeable people who can answer any specific questions you might have.

 

Dan

[Dastari Creel]

Greetings!

 

I used to have a 2600 but my parents sold that in 1990 and I haven't had an Atari system until today when I picked up a 7800. I have been active in the NES forums for the last couple of years though and I was curious. Is there a comparable Atari website to nesdev.parodius.com? Are there tutorials and documents about 2600/7800 hardware for both the systems and cartridges? Do people have tutorials on how to create new carts? Does anyone create new boards like retrousb does for NES or has anyone ever created something comparable to the NES powerpak for Atari?

 

I'm very curious as I want to get further into the hardware and software of the older video games and was wondering if there were references for the Atari.

 

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

 

I have a lot of information on the 2600 and 7800 on my web site http://www.atarihq.com/danb/ along with links to a lot of other good pages on the f si2600/7800 hardware.

 

There are also good 2600 and 7800 message boards here at Atari Age frequented by a lot of knowledgeable people who can answer any specific questions you might have.

 

Dan

 

Thanks for the response. I just wanted to find where the "repositories of knowledge" are before I started asking a lot of questions that may sound stupid to old timers. I find that on a lot of technical forums they're a lot happier if you've read the existing material before you start asking questions.

 

I have a project idea that has been niggling at me for a while. It may take a lot of time and effort but it would be really awesome if I succeed.

[tetrode kink]

There is information about all aspects of the 2600, but it tends to be sprinkled all over the web. Dan B.'s site is a good place to start, as he mentioned. There is some hardware information on AtariAge too, just click on "2600" at the top of this page, and check out the Hardware and Programming links. Other than that, you just have to keep an eye out for established posters here, sometimes they have links to their pages in their signatures, etc.

 

Ben Heckendorn comes to mind, he has built lots of portable 2600s from cut-down original 2600 boards. That and lots of other info on the 2600 on his site.

 

Also, member Longhorn Engineer has designed a small 2600 PCB that uses the original 2600 chips, designed to be the main board for a DIY portable 2600.

 

That should keep you busy for awhile.

 

-tet